June 24, 2008

Announcing the First Ever “Transform David Spedaris Into A Supervillain” Contest

[NOTE: If you are new to David Sedaris's unprovoked feud with me, you can start by reading here.]

This is some exciting, exciting stuff. In my quest to rid the best-seller lists of all things Spedaris, I am pleased to announce this contest, which was created by my friend and blog-helper Steve Huff.

The idea is so simple it’s genius: take any photo of the cigarette-devouring David Sedaris and, using whatever media are at your disposal, alter that photo in such a way as to transform the internationally esteemed memoirist and beloved NPR contributor into a supervillain.

What kind of supervillain? That, Dear Reader, is up to you.

I will announce the top three finalists on July 2nd. Then, two days later, on July 4th, the birthday of the greatest country in the world – a country which Mr. Sedaris has shunned for the Nutella-loving shores of France - I will announce the Grand Prize Winner!

What does that person win? The greatest prize in the history of prizes, that’s what: an autographed copy of my new book, “My Custom Van (and 50 Other Mind-Blowing Essays That Will Blow Your Mind All Over Your Face”)! I will personally have my assistant make it out to you with the inscription of your choice. PLUS, you will also receive a gift certificate to Bath & Body Works for twelve dollars. Truly an amazing, amazing prize. Total retail value: over fifteen dollars!!!

Please name your Spedaris supervillain and include a brief description of whatever super-villain powers he may possess.

To submit: either post your entry (entries?) to your image hosting account (like flickr or photobucket), then post a link to the image in the comment section of my blog.

Or you can send it to randomlunatic@gmail.com as an attachment and put "David Sedaris Supervillain" in the heading.

Good luck, Godspeed, and may the best David Spedaris Supervillain Portraitist win.

Camille -- go for it anyway. In 6th grade I thought I never won anything, so when it came time to enter a contest for best decorated box for Valentine's Day cards, I put together something really goofy and simple -- a shoebox wrapped in plain red tissue paper. On the top I wrote "please give to the heart fund" (hey -- I was in 6th grade, after all).

Well, I won the stupid thing. So don't sell yourself short.

If you have a flickr, photobucket, or imageshack account, you can upload the image to that and post a link in the comments here. Typepad comments automatically hyperlink, so just a cut & paste of the URL should be fine. Otherwise we may have an e-mail address to which you could send the image as an attachment. I'm waiting to see what Michael thinks of that idea, so I won't post the e-mail. I will say this, the e-mails would come to me and I'd forward the ones that were clearly intended to demonstrate via photo editing Mr. Sedaris's true, nefarious nature.

I won't participate in the contest because I thought of it, but I keep picturing Mr. Sedaris in some Ming the Merciless sort of getup.

I have a question though. Are there any rules for this contest? I mean like am I able to make Spedaris into an asshole. (I thought of it first. :P ) Or Would this not be allowed due to it being to graphic?

I'm only speaking for me here (meaning I haven't asked Michael what he thinks or anything), but if I were doing this, I'd adhere to a reasonable standard of taste. I'm fairly sure a big, hairy anal opening would not qualify. And remember: Supervillain. Lex Luthor, Ming of Mongo, the Phantom Limb (I'm a Venture Brothers fan, can't help it), Mr. Freeze, the Joker... you get the idea.

I forgot to add that the photo linked above is the one that inspired me to suggest this contest to Michael in the first place. (Chief Fever Nuts is a perfect anagram of my first, middle, and last names. And it made me laugh like an idiot when I came up with it.)